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DAM-L LS: Police Seal the Roads to Narmada Protest Villages (fwd)
NARMADA BACHAO ANDOLAN
B-13, Shivam Flats, Ellora Park, Baroda-390007 * 58, Gandhi Marg, Badwani,
M.P.
( Ph. 0265-382232/ 020 545 0870 .
Emails -baroda@narmada.org/sanjay@narmada.org)
Press Note/ August 23, 2000
Hundreds of Police Seal the Roads To Domkhedi-Jalsindhi
PANICKY GUJARAT GOVT. PREVENTS PEOPLE FROM GOING TO PEACEFUL PROGRAMME IN
NARMADA SATYAGRAHA: AT LEAST FOUR DETAINED.
In yet another bout of the reactionary intolerance, the Gujarat government
has deployed hundreds of police and has blocked all the ways towards the
Satyagraha place in the Narmada valley, to prevent the oustees, supporters
and prominent people from going there to attend the "Saga Of Narmada", a
peaceful programme of the oustees to be held on Thursday (August 24). The
Baroda Police have detained Joe Athialy, one of the main activists of
Narmada Bachao Andolan and four other supporters in the early hours today,
when they were proceeding towards Badwani, in M.P..Some more people also may
have arrested by now. Narmada Bachao Andolan condemns this as yet another
anti-people and reactionary manifestation of the state power, to suppress
the people's constitutional and democratic rights and appeals the President
and Prime Minister to make the state government respect rule of law and
Constitution of India.
It is reliably learnt that the Baroda police have received the 'instructions
from above' to prevent the people from reaching to the Satyagraha place.
Many prominent social-political activists, artists, journalists and human
rights activists are to go for the Thursday programme. Among them mare noted
senior human rights activist Justice ( Retd.) Rajinder Sachar, renowned
litterateur Ms. Arundhati Roy, veteran Gandhian Jyotibhai Desai, jurists
Girish Patel, Colin Gonsalves, journalists Darryl D'Monte and Mrs. Vidya
Baal and many others. Since it is easier from Baroda to reach the Satyagraha
place, many of them are to pass the city and go to Hapheshwar to reach
Satyagraha place. The " Saga of Narmada"(Narmada ki Pehchaan) was organised
to appeal to the nation's conscience regarding the issues raised by the
fifteen years of the struggle by the people against the SSP and other large
dams in Narmada in the Narmada valley.
However, from Wednesday ( August 22), without any provocation, hundreds of
police have been deployed and roads, vehicles are searched for those going
for the Satyagraha. The Gujarat government has demonstrated this unjust and
illegal intolerance time and again. At the time of the visit of the World
Commission on Dams, in the monsoon of 1998 and again at the time of the "
Rally for the Valley" in the monsoon of 1999, the state government had
similarly raised the unfounded bogey and tried to prevent the people from
reaching in the Narmada valley. In the early morning on August 24, when the
activists were proceeding towards Badwani in Madhya Pradesh, the police did
not allow them to cross Baorda and detained them under section 68 of Bombay
Police Act. All of them are kept in the police lock-up at Gorwa, in Baroda.
The vehicle also was taken away by the police. All the detained activists
have refused food in protest of their illegal and mala fide detention. The
detainees demanded the reasons for the police action. They wered told that
the Government of Madhya Pradesh demanded the detention of Satyagraha
people. The breach of peace and such reasons also have been given. All these
reasons are atrocious. The police are keeping vigil on NBA office in Baroda.
All the apparent reasons given by the state government and police are for
such police action are fictitious. The programme was slated to be in
Domkhedi (Maharashtra) and Jalsindhi (Madhya Pradesh), where the Satyagraha
has been continuing from July 15. Also, the number of people going to the
Satyagraha place from out of valley for this programme is not also large one
for such action. Thirdly, the so-called pro-dam organisations also did not
express their desire to oppose the programme. And after all the state
government has no business to prevent the people going for a peaceful
programme in other state - that is Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh? The
police are telling that the government wants to prevent Medha Patkar, one of
the main activists at Satyagraha, from going to the dam site. This has never
been the plan and Medha Patkar has gone many times to the dam site during
last couple of months. The police are also pleading that the NBA has not
taken the 'permission' from Gujarat police, for the programme, which is
going to take place in Maharashtra. Also, they are citing the reason of
prohibitory orders imposed in Baroda district for the 'Janmashtami'
festival, when Lord Krishna was born in the jail. All these are fanciful
reasons and the main reason is to prevent, with the misuse of law and
government machinery, a programme in Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh in
support of the oustees of the Sardar Sarovar Project. Thus, the Gujarat
government does not want the adivasis and peasants to express themselves and
the nation to hear their voice.
Number of social activists and organisations have condemned this neurotic
and cowardly reaction of the Gujarat government to the simple and peaceful
programme of the people in the Narmada valley. The state government seems to
be in the grips of the fundamentalists, for which it has become infamous
during couple of years, who are out to suppress any expression of dissent or
difference, even when it is not within their own legal and geographical
bounds. It is suppressing the right of the people all over the nation and
the people of Gujarat to know the truth. We appeal all the people and
organisations in India who believe in democracy, equality and freedom,
particularly that of the underprivileged and suppressed, to stand up against
the reactionary and anti-democratic posture of Gujarat government and make
it respect the Constitution of India and rule of law.
M.K. Sukumar
Alok Agrawal
Sanjay Sangvai